About 25% of the more than 65 public and corporate pension funds responding to a survey by Kleiman International Consultants expect to increase their emerging markets allocation over the next six to 12 months. Increases are expected to range from 10% to 100%, the average is expected to be 50%, Kleiman found. Pension funds surveyed had an average 3.8% allocation to emerging markets, and that could rise to an average of 5%, according to the survey.
Currently, U.S. pension funds in total invest about $150 billion in emerging markets, Kleiman estimates. Because total capitalization of the world's emerging stock markets is slightly more than $2 trillion, U.S. pension funds could now account for about 7.5% of total emerging market capitalization, Kleiman calculated.
